Forward, Backward, Slow, Fast, a Sun Shone

Sam Kinison died on his back on the side of a highway seemingly talking to God. Richard Pryor’s family and friends, thinking Pryor was dead after setting himself on fire, jumped over the fence of his compound in California and stole his belongings. When they found out he survived, they  jumped over the fence and put everything back. Jumped back. As empty-handed as the moon. “Let me tell you the truth,” Lenny Bruce once said, “the truth is what is and what should be is a fantasy—a terrible, terrible lie that someone gave the people long ago.” And that’s as sure as the sun. Which continues burning on without us. Which is in itself a kind of comedy, a kind of punchline. Like Pryor, there it is, setting itself on fire. And everything that happens after that is the joke. “I don’t want to die now,” Kinison said, looking up at the sky as he died. Then: “Oh, ok ... ok.”